Hatred

Over at Commentary, David Hazony posts on the concept of hate; specifically (and as strange as it may sound), defining both "good hatred" and " bad hatred". According to Hazony, "One is humane and moral, the other loathsome."

Do you feel a need to unleash hatred (verbally, written, etc.) upon those whom you feel deserve your wrath, and yet feel almost ashamed - by a culture and a media that tries to convince you that your particular kind of hatred is indicative of evil within the hater?

Then let Rabbi Shmuley Boteach be your guide, as he tells us why it is OK to hate terrorists:

I know how uncomfortable people feel about hatred. It smacks of revenge. It poisons the heart of those who hate. But this is true only if we hate the good, the innocent or the neutral. Hating monsters, however, motivates us to fight them. Only if an act like this repulses us to our core will we summon the will to fight these devils so that they can never murder again. . .

....But to love those who indiscriminately murder God’s children is an abomination against all that is sacred. Is there a man who is human whose heart is not filled with moral revulsion against terrorists who target a rabbi who feeds the hungry? Would God or Jesus ask me to extend even one morsel of my limited capacity for compassion to fiends rather than saving every last particle for their victims instead?

Makes sense; judge a man by his acts, and if they are morally repulsive, treat the man the same way.

Now how about another type of hatred - one that the media seems to almost approve of, by dint of simply refusing to damn it....meet Syrian actress Amal Arafa, who is asked what she thinks about the possibilty of peace with Israel:

Policies may change, but there is something that is already in my genes. We’ve been brought up to hate Israel. It’s in our genes. If Arab countries make political decisions, and there is peace, and so on and so forth–First of all, who would be against peace? I am not against peace. Of course not. But as far as I am concerned, Israel will continue to be a black, dark, and murky spot in my memory, in my genes, and in my blood. Even though I am Syrian, and not Palestinian, the Syrian upbringing we received, and by which we lived, we’ve suckled it with the milk of our mothers. There is no playing around with this, it’s in our genes, and we will pass this down for many more generations.

Hatred without cause, hatred without rationality - hatred for hate's sake, to paraphrase Captain Ahab. And yet women like these are feted, while someone who rightously rages against murderous Islamic terrorists are often singled out as "racist" or "prejudiced".

Want to know why Western Civilization is struggling? Look at whose anger and hate we accept, and those whose anger and hatred we reject. By rejecting the condemnation of evil we are also rejecting that which is good and moral within ourselves. And by accepting the blind hatred of someone like our Syrian actress as almost "natural", we encourage the rampaging of terror and evil as practiced by her spiritual bretheren, the Muslim terrorist. And the cycle continues on, with only one side - the West - losing no matter which way the coin falls.

Were this attitude prevelent in 1939, we would have lost the WWII for sure. No rage, no anger = no will to fight. Just ask the Democrats!

Speaking for myself - I will revel in my own hatred, as long as I know it is rightous...